OAKLAND — Cops, crime and affordable housing were on the table Thursday night at Temple Sinai, where more than 500 people listened as seven mayoral candidates tried to make their case in a race that one poll shows 40 percent of voters are still undecided.

The forum, moderated by KQED’s Cy Musiker, included opening and closing statements and specific questions with one- or two-minute answers. There are 15 mayoral hopefuls but the forum used the 5 percent polling threshold to select candidates.

“I will commit to having 900 police officers as a minimum for the Police Department,” said Tuman, when asked about his plan for public safety.

That would be about 250 more cops on the street than there are now, but like the other six candidates, Tuman didn’t mention how he would pay for them.

When asked about public safety, Quan said the crime rate has been coming down and there was even a period of six weeks this summer when there were no homicides.

“The reason is a combination of a lot of things,” Quan said. “We’ve reformed the Police Department, brought diversity to the department so that now half are people of color and we’ve put in a lot of violence prevention programs.”

Ruby said the Police Department is still a mess, and the city is “in the eighth year of a public safety crisis.”

“We need to ensure our officers are trained in community policing,” Ruby said. “If they do not adhere to the principles of community policing, they don’t get promoted. People in this city have given up even reporting all but the worst crimes.”

Schaaf said if elected, she would push for hiring more officers, and make them do their jobs better.

“Officers need to get out of their cars and build relationships of trust so we can create an atmosphere where people don’t commit those crimes in the first place,” Schaaf said.

Siegel said Quan’s assertion that the crime rate is down is wrong.

“It’s not even a noticeable difference,” Siegel said. “We need to increase the number of officers engaged in community policing from 277 to 513 and use restorative justice programs to keep nonviolent offenders out of the criminal justice system. And it’s a disgrace that we still have federal oversight of our Police Department.”

Kaplan said some of her colleagues on the City Council voted to lay off huge numbers of police, and “I voted no.

“Then the word went out that Oakland was an easy mark,” Kaplan said. “We need to restore the number of police to 800. I fought for and won an increase in the number of 911 dispatchers and evidence technicians.”

Parker said crime in Oakland is a question of questionable leadership.

“We’ve had too many police chiefs come and go and three city administrators in the last three years,” Parker said. “We have to get serious about our leadership. We need more officers, 800, and we need to use them smartly and in the right places.”

When asked about the need for more affordable housing, all the candidates said they were in favor of it, but they provided different ways to get there. Some talked about more stringent rent control and some talked about the city taking a bigger lead in increasing the supply to bring down the prices.

Siegel said he would create an affordable housing trust fund and build cheap units that cost $60,000 to $100,000 each on land owned by the city and the school district.

“We need to demand from developers that as part of your development price, part of that land has to be for housing,” Siegel said.

Kaplan said she would do a better job at enforcing tenant protection and would seek “outside funds for more transit-oriented housing.”

Parker talked about working with banks to stop foreclosures and to value diversity so that “the people who have lived here for generations don’t get pushed out. In 1980, this city was 50 percent African-American, now its down to around 25 percent.”

Quan said since becoming mayor she got 1,700 units of new affordable housing built in the city by using redevelopment funds, public-private partnerships and federal money.

“I just met with seven different banks and nonprofits to talk about building housing on rapid-transit corridors,” Quan said. “Affordable housing is the key component to making sure Oakland remains diverse.”

Ruby said the question of affordable housing comes back to public safety.

“We can’t drive development without safety,” Ruby said.

Schaaf said she helped push through what she said is the first transit-oriented development at the Fruitvale BART station and said the key is to increase the supply of housing to bring prices down.

Tuman said Oakland has “regional commitments” to build 14,000 units of housing for low and medium income residents “and I will meet that commitment. And I would sprinkle it among all the neighborhoods in the city so we don’t stigmatize it.”

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